Catenaa, Thursday, August 28, 2025-Japanese financial services giant SBI Group has entered a strategic partnership with blockchain oracle provider Chainlink to develop crypto tools for banks and financial institutions in Japan and across the Asia-Pacific region.
The deal, announced Sunday, will focus on tokenized real-world assets, stablecoin verification and cross-border transactions.
It is SBI’s fourth major crypto partnership in a week, following recent agreements with Circle, Ripple and Web3 infrastructure firm Startale.
SBI said its initial efforts with Chainlink will target the Japanese market, where the Financial Services Agency is preparing to approve the country’s first yen-denominated stablecoin as soon as next month.
The collaboration will use Chainlink’s interoperability protocol to support tokenization of bonds and funds, while also providing onchain verification of stablecoin reserves.
Chainlink co-founder Sergey Nazarov said the partnership was moving toward “production usage at a large scale,” citing prior work with SBI on stablecoin settlement and fund tokenization.
SBI CEO Yoshitaka Kitao added that the effort aims to power compliant cross-border stablecoin transactions and speed adoption of digital assets in Japan and beyond.
The initiative highlights SBI’s broader digital asset push, which includes plans to list Ripple USD (RLUSD) in Japan by March 2026 and expand domestic use of Circle’s USDC.
Its tie-up with Startale will also create a 24/7 onchain trading platform for tokenized stocks and assets.
The deal comes as family offices in Asia ramp up exposure to digital assets, with rising allocations to Bitcoin and tokenized funds amid a favorable regulatory climate and Bitcoin’s rally above $124,000.
